Fandom High School

"Sometimes you ain't strong enough." That was Reno's opening statement for the day, yes. He was standing in the classroom well before any of the students arrived, with his arms crossed over his chest and a solemn expression on his face. Possibly the first time some of his students had seen him looking anything but smug, he supposed. They'd have to cope. "Sometimes, you're gonna have to get out there and do shit that you know is too damn big for you, and either you ain't gonna be able to get it done, or else you will, and that'll end up bein' all the worse, yo."

( He cast his gaze across the students in the room. )

[Open!]

"Yo, Rookies!" Hark, was that the territorial call of the wild Reno in his natural habitat? Oh, it totally was. "Bit of a change of pace for you this week, yo. When this period ends, you're all on a mission, yo. This week, I ain't gonna be the teacher."

He smirked, and then set out on that slow, deliberate saunter of his, walking paces back and forth in front of the class.

"Half of you are. And half of you are gonna be the rookies. All you teachers? It's gonna be your job to look out for the rookies this week. Rookies? It's your job to be... rookies. Make like you don't know nothin'. Give your teacher a rough time, yo. Do whatever it is you figure rookies do."

He nodded at the board, where he'd scrawled out the names of the two groups.

"Today, just pair off, figure out what it is you're gonna be rookies at. You can teach and learn just about anything, but be prepared to tell me next week what it was you did and how it went, yo. Teachers? Word of advice? Just because you got some theoretical kinda power right now don't mean you get to abuse it. If you're gonna tell 'em to run laps around the island, you damn well better be prepared to run 'em too. And you better be better at it. They ain't gonna respect you if you don't come off as competent, yo. They're your rookies, so it's up to you to set an example, here."

He smirked, and then waved his hands at the class.

"Go on, get to it. Don't let me keep you waitin', yo."

[Open!]

When Reno stepped into the classroom today, he was... dressed somewhat unusually. It wasn't that he wasn't wearing his usual suit, mind. It was more that his white button-down was now in a remarkable state of tie-dye, and there were multicolored ferret-footprints up and down his jacket. Not to mention the random blue streaks in his hair, and the technicolor ferret that was ravaging the contents of the wastepaper basket over in the corner.

Perhaps surprisingly, he was grinning.

"Yo, Rookies!" Mako, the ferret in the basket, honked counterpoint to Reno's greeting. "This week, I'm gonna talk a little about that chip you might have sittin' on your shoulder when you step into a new situation, yo. You know the one, I'm thinkin'. It's that little voice in the back of your head that makes you damn sure that you're gonna get in there, and you're gonna be better than anyone else who ever did the job, and how dare whoever is sittin' three ranks above you not take the job as seriously as you do when you only been around for like a week, and they've been there for freakin' ever, yo."

He gave Elena a pointed look at that, his grin not wavering in the least.

"Some Rookies learn to lose that chip a bit slower'n others, but when they figure it out, they do a damn good job of it, yo. See, thing is, there ain't nothin' the matter with wantin' to do a good job. But when you get past the point of doin' the job, and you get into a place where you're sacrificing yourself for it, you've just stopped being whatever it is you're trying to prove you are... And you've started bein' a damn fool."

He shifted his weight a bit, almost uncomfortably, and then he leaned back against his desk, arms crossing over his chest.

"When you do what you're doin', make sure it's for the right damn reasons. Ain't gonna impress nobody by shuttin' yourself off just to prove you're better, yo. So this week, we're going to do a nice, simple assignment. No syrup, no Jell-o, no feathers even though they were funny as hell. Just talk about what you think the difference is between doin' the job for the sake of doin' what needs to be done, and doin' it because you got somethin' to prove."

A pause, and then he pulled a gold coin out of his pocket and flipped it. "Makita, you won the coin toss, yo. Go stand by Elena, there, Rookie. Maybe see if she knows anything about how to get ducks outta a kitchen while you're at it, yoto."

[Open!]